Identifying the trends in a quickly changing market

Each year the market analysts, researchers and publishers Laing and Buisson publish the “bible”of the homecare sector called Domiciliary Care Markets. The 2002 edition is the fifth and is summarised below. Local authority homecare – Contacts with social services: There were 3.3 million screened contacts with social services in England during 2000/2001 of which 1.8 million had a further needs assessment or commissioned service. Of these, 1.6 million clients received services: 85 per cent received a community care package and 21 per cent were admitted to a care home. – Homecare contact hours continue to increase: There were 4 per cent more homecare contact hours bought or directly provided by local authorities in 2000 compared to 1999. 2000 therefore saw the resumption in growth characterising the previous eight years which had been briefly broken by a fall in 1998. Eighty seven English local authorities increased the number of hours they funded, and 62 reduced their hours, particularly outer London boroughs. –